Lesley Lokko

Saffron Skies

Max Sall is wealthy, powerful and utterly ruthless, a self-made man without a past. His wife, Angela, a society debutante who fell in love with the enigmatic, handsome chauffeur, broke her parents' hearts when she married him. His mistress is Francesca, the glamorous air stewardess who saw in Max Sall her ticket out of the Italian provinces and grabbed it, and him, with both hands.

And then there are his daughters. Amber, more like her father than she will ever know, smart, driven and determined to succeed whatever the cost; and Paola, groomed by her mother to succeed where she has failed, in getting a man to marry her.

While Amber and Paola are growing up in the seventies, their mothers somehow find a way to share Max between them. But when Amber and Paola fall in love with the same man two decades later, they are determined that this time there will be no sharing.

Moving effortlessly across five decades, Saffron Skies is a magnificent story of sisters, friends, families and love.

'An intelligent, exciting blockbuster.' Eve

'Compulsively readable.' Time Out

First published in the UK by Orion.